But the discoveries of Watt and Stephenson, seem to me to have added another stage to general civilization, viz., the railway; and it seems also to me that we might call the present era “the railway-oceanic.”
The Canadian Pacific Railway scheme was completed in 1887. It has a total length of at least 3,000 miles, starting from Quebec and finishing at Vancouver’s Island on the Pacific. Its marvellous success will also considerably change the general tenor of the Pacific even more than the Panama or Nicaragua scheme will do. An express train can cross in five days, while the voyage from Vancouver to Yokohama in Japan, would only occupy twelve days steaming at the rate of fourteen or fifteen knots an hour. From England the whole journey to Shanghai and Hong Kong by this route would take only thirty-four or thirty-five days, and Australia now has direct communication with the mother country through a sister colony.
Last of all, Japan would have much better communication with the European markets generally than is possible at the present time, if the English proposed[[17]] mail steamers should run, and it is said that the Canadian Pacific route would bring Japan within twenty-six or twenty-seven days’ reach of England.
On the other hand, if the Russian Siberian Railway scheme should be carried out to the Pacific at Vladivostock, it would open a very large field of trade and commerce with inland Siberia to Japan. It would be still more so if the Chinese railways were extended so as to open the entire empire.[[18]]
Japan has not only a splendid future before her with regard to commercial greatness, but has every chance of rising to the head of manufacturing nations. In the latter respect she has advantages over Vancouver’s Island and New South Wales, her rivals on the Pacific. She is known to possess valuable mineral resources, having good coal mines at Kiushiu and Hokkukaido. The climate of Japan varies in different localities, but on the whole is exceedingly healthy. Consisting as the country does of numerous islands she has many good harbours and trading ports. Wages are low though they might rise if a corresponding increase of labour is required. The credit system is fairly well carried out[[19]] and is growing day by day. There are about four hundred banks, including the Bank of Japan; and the medium of exchange has a regular standard. The principal exports are silk, tea, coal, and rice. Japan is not the producer of raw goods for manufacturing purposes, but simply works them up. Her area is not in comparison with the commercial greatness which she will attain in the future. She may import raw goods from America, Australia, and the Asiatic countries, in the same way that England does. Her position enables her also to obtain wool from Australia and California, also cotton from China, Manchooria, India, and Queensland. All these imports are worked up into different manufacturing goods. She has an advantage here over England, for she has not so far to send her manufactured goods, and does not need, like England, to send them all round the world.
Thus we see Japan has ample scope from a commercial point of view, and has plenty of friendly countries close at home for the production of her raw material, and has great advantages in sea routes to America and Australia.
The Japanese are born sailors, being islanders.
There are several large steamship companies[[20]] whose ships are continually plying along her own shores[[21]] and also to the mainland of China, and one company contemplates shortly opening communication with North and South America. It has often puzzled me why Japan does not hold closer relations with Australia, especially as Australia is becoming one of her most important neighbours in commerce. I can certainly predict that if this suggestion comes to pass, that together they will in the future hold the key of the Pacific trade.
Australia and her near colonies have already begun to play an important part in the affairs of the Pacific; and why should she not, considering their natural wealth and general progress? European Powers have begun to take great interest, both commercially and diplomatically, in these colonies. England, France, Spain, and Holland long ago saw the advantage of having secured coaling stations in the Pacific, and England and France have always taken great care in selecting posts in the immediate vicinity of the sea route between America and Australia; and since the working of the Canadian Pacific Railway and the Panama Canal, they have begun to annex those islands which lie near the route from Panama to the Australian colonies, and from the latter to Vancouver. The French occupation of Tahiti and the Rapa (both containing good harbours) in 1880 was with the distinct object of controlling the sea route from Panama to Sydney, Brisbane, and Auckland. England also began to fortify Jamaica in 1887, and she is now casting her eyes on Raratonga. The dispute regarding the New Hebrides and the Samoan Conference[[22]] were simply for the protection of the Vancouvan-Australian-San-Franciscan sea-ways. England has lately annexed the Ellice Islands and undoubtedly will shortly occupy the Gilbert and Charlotte Islands.
Germany also has been considering the Asiatic-Australian routes, foreseeing that the whole Pacific question rests on that basis. In 1884 she annexed New Guinea, and the Bismarckian policy proved a severe blow to the British power in the North and West Pacific. There are three great sea routes from New South Wales to Hong Kong and other parts of the North Pacific; one travels eastward of the Solomon Islands and New Caledonia (6,000 miles) and the other two westward of the above-mentioned islands (5,500 and 5,000 miles).